The present invention relates to a rolling-bearing mounted apparatus having a shaft which is supported on a section of the apparatus by at least one rolling bearing.
The following discussion of related art is provided to assist the reader in understanding the advantages of the invention, and is not to be construed as an admission that this related art is prior art to this invention.
Rolling-bearing mounted units and/or assemblies allow axial movement of high-precision apparatuses and must have guidance which is free from play or is pre-tensioned. This guidance is achieved by means of high-precision surfaces and rolling elements which are matched to one another in the micrometer range.
Apparatuses which have internal thermal loss sources that vary over time significantly influence the pre-tensioning situation and thus the guidance of the unit and/or the assembly. The heat input into the unit and the adjacent units is for the most part non-uniform. Different operating temperatures therefore occur as a result of their different heat-absorbing or heat-emitting properties. The thermal expansion of the individual elements of the different assemblies thus differs as a result of the different operating temperatures. As a result, the rolling element contacts can either be subject to play or pre-tensioned so greatly that the play-free guidance function is no longer guaranteed or the machine element malfunctions as a result of overloading of the rolling contact.
It would therefore be desirable and advantageous to provide an improved rolling-bearing mounted apparatus which obviates prior art shortcomings and in which thermal stress does not adversely affect operation of the rolling bearing.